


Burning the Kingdom

by Gatinha15



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Ashes, F/M, King of the Ashes, Petyr Baelish Week, The Iron Throne, keepshady2017
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-05
Updated: 2017-10-05
Packaged: 2019-01-09 11:10:07
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,789
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12275211
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gatinha15/pseuds/Gatinha15
Summary: There is nothing left but the remaints of the once living and of the frozen dead. The kingdom has burned under the fire of ambition and greed,It just happens that Petyr Baelish is better than anyone else at this game.Originally intended for Petyr Baelish week 2017: day 2- King of the Ashes...





	Burning the Kingdom

**Author's Note:**

> I had originally intended to post it for Petyr Baelish week 2017: day 2- King of the Ashes but I know I am late...  
> Hope you'll enjoy it though !  
> I do not own the picture used below, I just find it pretty evocative :)

 

The smell of burned flesh, both fresh and rotten, was almost unbearable. Though assailing the nostrils as if burning them too, the stench was nothing compared to the image of corpses on fire, turning into a pile of ashes, that will forever be rooted in mind as a reminder of the world's madness.

 

It had been too easy.

The Dragon Queen always had an impulsive temper and just a word dropped at the right time had surprisingly sufficed to sent her burn King's Landing to the ground, White Walkers and citizens all the same.

She thought she would be seen as the legitimate Queen with this display of power but what she truly had been was the spitting image of her father, a Mad Queen who lost her head to love.

When the news of Jon Snow's death reached Dragonstone, the poor Jorah Mormont barely prevented her from jumping off the cliffs. Since, a broken heart and despair had clouded her judgment and left her thirsty for blood.

The North had fallen. Yet, he was sure the one he often thought about stood proud till the end, every inch of the queen she was. Sometimes, he wondered what she must have thought during her last moments. Did she think of him while she was breathing for the last time?

The pain was perpetually here, a welcome reminder of all his mistakes: he had promised he would protect her and failed countless of times. With Ramsay. With the danger from North of the Wall. He saw how hurt she had been by her sister's coldness and her two brothers' indifference: a trained faceless assassin, a king bastard and a crippled bird were not the family she remembered and often dreamed of. Yet, he still left her in this doomed northern castle to die.

Certain nights, he would dream of her lying alone and cold on the floor, blood staining the heavy furs and her porcelain skin. Her dead blue eyes were staring at his very soul and her now silent lips seemed to call his name, again and again.

_"A picture of me on the Iron Throne and you by my side"  
_

But she was right. And it had been only a pretty picture and Petyr Baelish was not a man that let himself be plagued by guilt or scruples. It had been a hopeless illusion to believe even one second that she would have been his. Despite all his efforts to teach her his methods and his lies, to change her, she remained a Stark wolf and she died the same way all Starks died: foolishly.

He knew she would have not hesitated to sacrifice him for all the values he despised: _Family, Duty, Honour_. They already cost him so much he thought, passing a hand over his scar

So as soon as he heard that the North's favourite bastard had made an alliance with Daenerys Targaryen, he left and began placing his pieces.

The night before his departure, she summoned him to her chambers. When she asked for his mockingbird pin ' _a token',_ his treacherous heart had beat wildly and in a foolish way he had wanted to tell her: "Sansa, come with me. I love you."

But he stood speechless and she took the pin. Perhaps she had learned from his lessons after all, for her last words to him were an almost convincing lie:

"I wish you a safe trip, Lord Baelish"

Petyr would never admit it but leaving her, like leaving Cat, had tore the heart he didn't know he still possessed and left it similar to the chaos of flames and ashes that stretched before his eyes.

However, as unappealing this sinister vision was, Littlefinger couldn't help but being proud of his deeds. All of this was his now. His kingdom.

Yes, he had played his own game and in the end he had to sacrifice some of his best assets but he didn't have to fight , didn't go on the battlefield to die eaten by white walkers or burnt by dragonfire.

He just had to wait for them to destroy each other before revealing himself the master of the chessboard. All these warriors had only seen the threat coming before them, not the one coming from behind.

It still made him laugh to think that the honourable empty-headed Ned Stark had trusted him when he had so explicitly warned him not to.

Anyway, they were all dead now. Varys had once prophetically referred  him as King of the ashes and Petyr couldn't deny the image was appealing

All these proud lords and ladies, these mighty warriors, these guardians of moral order were nothing but ashes in the soil he ruled over. Brandon, Hoster, Edmure, Ned, Cat, Jon, Daenerys, Cersei, Arya, etc, were dead and he was their king now.

A flash of red passed before his eyes. Where there were only flames and cries and the death, he could only see how her hair used to fall so gracefully behind her back, how he had loved the vision of her under Winterfell's weirwood tree and how the snow highlighted her vibrant blue eyes.

 _She was a weakness and she would have destroyed you like you destroyed her family._ whispered Littlefinger. _Good riddance._

Good riddance…

 

Petyr was walking through what was left of King's Landing, sometimes recognising a street.

After a moment, he even passed in front of one of his former brothels, the mockingbird decorations burned but still recognisable.

The irony of it made Petyr crack a smile. The mockingbird had been hurt and scarred but he had lived among the predators and had survived them all.

Like with a game of cyvasse, he had made his moves and seen them fall: House Baratheon, Tyrell, Lannister, Targaryen, Stark were all extinct.

He made his way through the chaos he loved so much and reached the Red Keep or again what was left of it. The gaping hole in the place of the Great Sept of Baelor had only been the beginning.

But it was still there, the seat he had though for the major part of his life. The Iron Throne Cersei and Daenerys died for. And it was his.

Never had he felt this way before: satisfied. Ashes were falling from the destroyed roof and over his shoulders, mingling in his hair.

Petyr knew he looked regal in his black cloak, covered in ashes as the true king he was and the silver claiming his temples perfectly adequate with the crown he had ordered to be made for him in Essos. Too bad no one was here to see him.

The throne was uncomfortable as expected but there was nowhere in the world he would be instead.

Of course, the whole palace would take years to rebuilt with the help of the loyal men he kept in Essos but he could already picture the room when restored: his sigil banners hanging proudly, green and silver to contrast with the gold and red the crown displayed for so many years.

However, the vision disappeared when the most odd noise could be heard through the room. Like the echo of a long gone voice.

"Who's there?" he asked, leaving his dominant position of the Throne to stand in the centre of the room.

"Petyr…" the voice was behind him now.

Taken by surprise, he swiftly drew a knife out of his pocket and raised it to his opponent throat.

Yet, it was no opponent but the vision of Death herself standing before him. The eyes, bluer than the brightest sapphire, contrasted with the mortally pale skin and pierced his soul all over again. Her hair was wild and her clothes dirty but no mistake could be made on who he was face to face with. The woman he gave his heart to and who crushed it.

She was one of them now and had come to kill him. _What a perfect death_ he though with irony. Life must hate him.

"If you are to be my end, I have only one request: a kiss"

She stood there and pondered his words before finally answering a brief smile finding its way on her face.

"Already bargaining, aren't you, Lord Baelish?" He pouted as she referred him to his past title knowing he would want to correct her. "I didn't come to kill you"

"Aren't you one of them?"

"I should be. But I can still remember my past life and experience emotions so I might not be quite dead."

"What happened?"

Sansa sighed and looked down at her hands where she was holding the dagger he had given her too before leaving.

"They came not long after you fled. Arya fought on the walls but I knew we would lose so I took your dagger and went down into the crypts to say a last goodbye to the ones I loved."

While speaking, he noticed she was clutching at something on her cloak and couldn't help but swell with happiness when he saw it was his pin. Perhaps she did care for him.

"Just under my father's statue, I killed myself with your dagger. I don't know if it is the valerian steel I used to pierce my heart that prevented my complete transformation but when I woke up I was like this and everyone else was gone joining the army of the dead."

Petyr didn't have to be told to understand that the way she died had a meaning. It was as if he had done that to her because he made her lose all hope. He hurt her with Ramsay and left her again in the castle she didn't call home anymore.

"What do you want then?" he smiled in turn, recalling their little mind-games.

She must have understood it too for she came closer and put a frozen hand over his heart.

"I knew you would be there. My body may be dead but I feel like my heart isn't and I don't know why, I just knew."

Sansa raised her eyes again, blue meeting grey-green again in a familiar and comforting way.

"I thought my heart would be forever cold before dying but now I know I want to spent the life I lost with you. "

And without any other words needed, their lips met and death united with the warmth of life. She tasted of pomegranate and cold winter sun and he didn't want to let her go ever again.

He was a living man with a dead heart and she was dead but so full of life still. They were truly fire and ice.

They were a perfect match: King and Queen of the Ashes.

 

Long may they reign.


End file.
